WHO IS MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS? WHAT IS HER CONNECTION TO QUEEN ELIZABETH? WHAT IS HER LEGACY?
ANSWER PREPARED BY: HENRY


Queen Elizabeth’s rival was her cousin Queen Mary of Scots. Mary was a granddaughter of Henry VIII's sister Margret who had married King James IV of Scotland. On December 7th 1542 Mary was born. Mary was Catholic and her cousin Elizabeth Protestant. Mary’s first position in power was when she married the king of France. Her husband in 1559 was killed in a jousting accident. Mary soon became unwelcome in France and returned to Scotland. After she returned to Scotland she married Henry Darnley. Early into their marriage Darnley murdered Mary’s private secretary David Razzio. Her husband was later murdered. The person thought to murder her husband was James Hepburn and after her husbands death Mary married him. The people of Scotland were outraged that Mary married the man suspected of her husbands murder. She was thrown in jail for her actions in 1570. A few months into her captivity a plan was made for her escape. She helplessly fled to England and pleaded for Mary’s help.

Mary was welcomed to England with open arms. Soon after her arrival rumors spread of her lust for the English crown, she was thrown in jail. Mary was involved in many plots to murder Queen Elizabeth. Catholics throughout England and Europe wanted Mary, a Catholic, in rule. There were many plots to murder Elizabeth and replace her with Mary. Mary certainly knew and secretly approved these plots even after she sought Elizabeth’s protection. Many plots failed and she was not killed for them, Elizabeth had sympathy for her cousin despite all the crying out for her execution. Mary was given this mercy until she was tricked into involving herself into another plot by order of Elizabeth, Mary had stayed in jail for 18 years until she was condemned to death by Elizabeth and beheaded. Her death opened an invasion of England by Spain because she had no one to succeed her, but this invasion failed for various reasons. Mary was killed for the threats she posed.

WORKS CITED:
Newsweek Book Division, . Tower of London. Italy: Newsweek, 1971. 78-79. Print.
Hinds, Kathryn. Life in Elizabethan England The Church. TarryTown New York: Marshall Cavendish Corporation, 2008. 42,71. Print.

"Mary Queen of Scots." Web. <http://www.elizabethi.org/us/queenofscots/>.
Lace, William W. Elizabethan England. Farmington Hills MI: Thomson Gale, 2006. 20-22 45-55. Print.
For more information about Mary Queen of Scots go to
http://www.elizabethi.org/us/queenofscots/